I’m Professor and Chair of the Department of Economics at LIU Post in New York. I’ve published several articles in professional journals and magazines, including Barron’s, The New York Times, Japan Times, Newsday, Plain Dealer, Edge Singapore, European Management Review, Management International Review, and Journal of Risk and Insurance. I’ve have also published several books, including Collective Entrepreneurship, The Ten Golden Rules, WOM and Buzz Marketing, Business Strategy in a Semiglobal Economy, China’s Challenge: Imitation or Innovation in International Business, and New Emerging Japanese Economy: Opportunity and Strategy for World Business. I’ve traveled extensively throughout the world giving lectures and seminars for private and government organizations, including Beijing Academy of Social Science, Nagoya University, Tokyo Science University, Keimung University, University of Adelaide, Saint Gallen University, Duisburg University, University of Edinburgh, and Athens University of Economics and Business. Interests: Global markets, business, investment strategy, personal success.

What Will Bring Manufacturing Jobs Back

NEW YORK, NY - JANUARY 18: Older job-seekers participate in a career counseling session at a 'Work Search' event aimed at older unemployed people January 18, 2011 at a high school gymnasium in the Harlem neighborhood of New York City. The event, sponsored by the American Association of Retired Persons (AARP), consisted of workshops for basic job skills like resume building targeted to an over-50 job seeking demographic. Unemployment for older worker has decreased slightly in the past year, though rates are still three times higher than they were a decade ago, when only 2.5 percent of people over 45 were jobless. (Image credit: Getty Images via @daylife)

Of all questions surrounding December’s payroll report that showed a decline in manufacturing jobs, one stands out: What will bring these jobs back? What will take to convince American companies to relocate manufacturing back to the US from China?

The fixing of the “middle-skills” gap.

In a global economy, manufacturing decisions should be primarily based on economic rather than patriotic criteria. This means that companies like Apple should allocate manufacturing to countries with a large supply of manufacturing skills. Is America one of these countries?

Definitely not, according to government statistics. America is poor when it comes to skills needed in manufacturing like computer support specialists, electrical technicians, telecommunication installers, and so on.

Through collaborative training programs among companies, labor unions, and government, according to Thomas Kochan, David Finegold, and Paul Osterman, authors of “Who Can Fix The Middle-Skills Gap,” published recently in Harvard Business Review. “ We think that companies can and should take the lead in training workers to fill the middle-skills gap. Realistically, that can happen on a large enough scale only if business leaders cooperate with one another, unions, and educational institutions, both regionally and nationally. The key words are cooperate and nationally.”

The Bottom line: Bringing manufacturing back to America cannot happen overnight with empty talk about “things that would have been done,” joining Apple’s CEO Tim Cook to quote Steve Jobs. Made in America cannot be just a patriotic act. It is a lengthy rational process that takes the right polices to build the “middle-skills gap.”

Also read:

The Four Drivers of Corporate Failure in America

7 Things that Make the Difference Between Marketing Dreams and Marketing Reality

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